The city of Louisville, Kentucky, has agreed to pay $12 million to the family of Breonna Taylor, the 26-year-old EMT killed by police six months ago, to settle a wrongful death lawsuit, family attorney Sam Aguilar confirmed to CNN.
Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer is expected to announce the settlement later Tuesday in a joint press conference with the Taylor family’s attorneys. Speaking to News Radio 840 WHAS on Tuesday morning, Fischer declined to comment on the settlement, saying, “I don’t have anything to announce on that at this time.”
Taylor’s family sued the city after Louisville Metro Police officers broke down the door to Taylor’s apartment and fatally shot her while executing a late-night, “no-knock” warrant in a narcotics investigation on March 13.
A CNN review of the shooting found that police believed Taylor was home alone when she was in fact accompanied by her boyfriend, who was legally armed. That miscalculation, along with the decision to press forward with a high-risk, forced-entry raid under questionable circumstances, contributed to the deadly outcome.
Taylor’s boyfriend, who said he believed the home was being broken into, shot and injured an officer, and police killed Taylor in the return fire. The officers were not wearing body cameras, police said.
Until Freedom, a social justice organization that has protested in Louisville, released a statement Tuesday reacting to the reported city settlement.
“No amount of money will bring back Breonna Taylor,” the group said. “We see this settlement as the bare minimum you can do for a grieving mother. The city isn’t doing her any favors. True justice is not served with cash settlements. We need those involved in her murder to be arrested and charged. We need accountability. We need justice.”
The Louisville Metro Police Department declined to comment. The police union did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Aguilar confirmed the settlement on Tuesday morning.
“The city’s response in this case has been delayed and it’s been frustrating, but the fact that they’ve been willing to sit down and talk significant reform was a step in the right direction and hopefully a turning point,” Aguilar said.
Kentucky AG leads criminal investigation
None of the three officers involved in the flawed raid has been charged with a crime. One officer, Brett Hankinson, was fired in late June for “wantonly and blindly” firing 10 rounds into her apartment, then-interim Louisville Police Chief Robert Schroeder wrote.
The fatal police shooting has led to months of protests in Louisville and across the country under the overarching Black Lives Matter movement against anti-Black racism and police violence. Since her death, the police chief was fired in June after a separate police shooting, and the Louisville city council passed “Breonna’s Law,” which banned no-knock search warrants.
Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron, the first Black person to hold the post and a Republican rising star, was made a special prosecutor in the case earlier this year, and the FBI has opened an investigation as well.
A grand jury has been empaneled to investigate the shooting, though an announcement has not been made about those proceedings.
Cameron is expected to announce a charging decision soon, though he has declined to provide a specific timeline.
“My office is continually asked about a timeline regarding the investigation into the death of Ms. Breonna Taylor. An investigation, if done properly, cannot follow a specific timeline,” Cameron tweeted last week.
The-CNN-Wire
